Server Side Include Imaging Secrets

Amazing things can be accomplished with SSI (Server Side Includes). If you have used SSI, it is probably for breaking up your pages into easily definable chunks (top, footer, sidebar, etc.) in order to keep file sizes smaller and to quickly make alterations by just modifying the include file instead of all your pages.

SSI can also work magic with images in order to keep your pages changing and lively. In fact, you can use it in place of a random javascript image changer to rotate images on your site.

If you are unfamiliar with SSI, have a look at this page from Big Nose Bird (link opens a new window). We will use the list at the bottom of that page, the unix style date format codes, as the basis for this tutorial.

As noted on the BigNoseBird page, you can make the local date and time appear on your page just by adding the following snippet of code, the "echo directive"